Break Those Damn Rules!

Who made up the rules, and why do we have to follow them?

A friend, and long time pro photographer, looked at my portrait photography last year and the first thing that struck him was that I often didn't use the traditional method of framing single person portrait photographs and mostly used "landscape" instead. It got me to thinking about why we have rules at all in photography. Quite often in our attempts to follow these rules (rule of thirds etc.) we make dull, boring, yawn, the same as all the other, yuck, please shoot me now, looking photos and sometimes when we inadvertantly break the rules the result is quite pleasing, and a breath of fresh air to me.

Maybe we should discard the rules and strike out to make photographs that stir the human soul instead. Can emotion ever have a formula? Heck, I want a photo to move me in some way. It should either make me happy, or sad, or nostalgic, or angry, or any damn thing but impressed with how well the photographer has handled the technical aspect of his mundane subject so well.

I would feel a lot more righteous about all of this if I didn't fall into the same trap myself on such a regular basis... oh well, back to the drawing board.

Strobist DIY Beauty Dish Portrait

Taken with my Strobist DIY Beauty Dish. I fire the Nikon SB600 wirelessly in the Strobist DIY Beauty Dish by raising the D90's onboard flash and using it as the commander. By setting the onboard flash at minimum power it has the added advantage of raising the light in the shadow side of the models face just a slight bit.

My Genuine German Beer Mug!

My step daughter in London picked this up for me at a boot sale and sent it to me in South Africa. It's simply the best Christmas present ever! It still says W-Germany on the bottom so it must be fairly old, and although used it's still in great condition.

It might just be me, but a beer certainly seems to taste better when I drink it out of this classy mug!

You can take my photo...

...but I don't have to be happy about it!

Look For A Different View!

So one thing I like to do is find a different way of looking at a scene that's been done a thousand times before. Reflections, unusual angles, or just the videographers LCD screen! Hope his work isn't copyrighted, or he may sue me for using his material, even if it is just a fraction of a fraction of a second...

Sometimes you have to get down and dirty!

In this case it was down on my belly in the aisle of a packed church with people looking at me funny... but I got the shot I wanted!

Note to self: humility is good for me.

Cafe Riche at Night

I took this a while back on a Canon 350D and the kit lens in crazy low light, hand held. It came out a lot sharper than I anticipated. It's a late night bar on the western side of Church Square in Pretoria, South Africa.